


We Sat on Our Own Star and Dreamed

by fuzzballsheltiepants



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Aaron POV, Domestic Fluff, F/M, M/M, Moving In Together, Post-Canon, Pregnant!Katelyn, twinyard bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:48:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23991796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzballsheltiepants/pseuds/fuzzballsheltiepants
Summary: Aaron & Katelyn have been too busy with their internships at the hospital to visit anyone, but Andrew and Neil just bought a house and they took a few days off to help them move.  Fluff and introspection ensue.
Relationships: Aaron Minyard & Andrew Minyard, Katelyn/Aaron Minyard, Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
Comments: 46
Kudos: 436





	We Sat on Our Own Star and Dreamed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sm-pcnlr (devillikeme_9)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/devillikeme_9/gifts).



> This is a long, long overdue gift for @sm-pcnlr, who was hoping for some post-canon Fox POV of Andreil being sweet and domestic together. Thankfully, they like Aaron, because once this idea popped into my head there was little else I could think about! 
> 
> Thank you as always to @tntwme for the beta, and to @foxsoulcourt for keeping me going when I wanted to give up because sometimes writing is Hard.

“Ready?”

There was a wry twist to Katelyn’s smile, one Aaron hadn’t seen in a while; it only made its appearance when Andrew was in the vicinity. He slipped his hand into hers where it rested on the gear shift and looked up through the windshield at the house.

It was...nice. Almost generic, blending into the neighborhood. This shouldn’t seem strange, but when did Andrew and Neil ever do anything normal? And this house was normal, on the outside at least. Go figure. Gray, large windows, nice landscaping. A part of him wondered if this was Neil’s instinct for a plausible front. You can take the man out of the mafia, but...

“Come on,” Katelyn said, giving his fingers a squeeze. “Let’s get this over with.”

Yet she was the one who hung back half a step as they made their way up the front walkway, and Aaron was the one who reached up to knock.

The door was yanked open practically before his knuckles had left the wood. “Good, you’re here,” Neil said by way of greeting. “You can tell your brother he’s being a dick.”

“I thought you liked dick,” Aaron said before he could stop himself. Katelyn elbowed him in the ribs but there was a pinching around her mouth that only appeared when she was suppressing a laugh.

Neil flipped him off. “You can also tell him he’s a _fucking asshole!”_ The last bit was directed over his shoulder, into the echoing emptiness of the house.

“Again,” Aaron murmured.

“Shut up, babe,” Katelyn said cheerfully. “How can we help?”

“Come in, I guess.” Neil spun on his heel and stalked into the house. Aaron and Katelyn exchanged a look and followed, shutting the door before the obscenely fluffy cat who was eyeballing the gap could make a bid for freedom.

Aaron knew Andrew and Neil had cats. They never posted pictures of themselves on social media, but somehow the cats had a fan account. Nicky was certain that was Neil’s doing, but Aaron wasn’t so sure. The picture of one of the cats wearing wire-rimmed glasses while sitting on a book seemed much more in line with Andrew’s sense of humor.

It still made his brain hurt. Did Andrew scoop litter boxes? Did they sleep on his face? Did he go out and buy them little jingly balls to play with? Aaron had questions, not that they’d ever get answered.

The short hallway opened up into a room that was another surprise, large and airy and full of light. The room was mostly empty, save for two cat carriers, a couple pieces of luggage, and a small stack of boxes marked _Fragile._ And Andrew, sitting cross-legged on the floor, an orange blob of cat in his lap.

There was always a strange sort of jolt, seeing Andrew for the first time in a while. That surreal feeling of looking into an imperfect mirror. Never as bad as that first time: Andrew, dressed in orange with a buzzed prison haircut, something hardened and too goddamn old lurking in his too-young eyes. Aaron, desperate, scraped raw by pain and withdrawl. Yet despite the waves in the glass that distorted the reflection, there had still been something Aaron had never before known. Recognition. An unfamiliar hope, quickly beaten down, only to resurge over and over. No matter how hard he tried he couldn’t tell if the look he sometimes saw flicker across Andrew’s face was his own hope reflected.

Andrew’s eyes sharpened when they hit him, and Aaron crossed the polished floor for a fist bump. Aaron didn’t know if Andrew had the same funhouse mirror experience he did; he’d never asked. Not in all those hours spent in Dobson’s office, with the stupid little cups of hot chocolate and the stupid precise glass animals and the stupid understanding Andrew had with her. Not in the years after, during late-night phone calls in the on-call room at the hospital, where little was said but just the sound of Andrew’s steady voice was enough to quiet the restless question in Aaron’s chest.

“So, uh,” Aaron said, his voice echoing in the empty room, “where’s all your shit?”

“Moving van will be here in about fifteen minutes.” Andrew’s voice was as level as always, but his eyes flicked over to Neil. Aaron couldn’t help but look; if spontaneous combustion of a human was actually a thing that happened, he would probably be reaching for a fire extinguisher. But that was Neil, though; always burning up over something, serious or otherwise. Hell, he had burned the whole team down with him, just about. And for some reason, Andrew was drawn to that. Andrew, who had always been stone. There was some sort of irony there Aaron was in no mood to parse out.

“The view is lovely,” Katelyn said, drifting towards the enormous windows. She wasn’t just being polite. Gray-blue mountains, frosted in white, rose in the distance like the backdrop in some play; but what caught Aaron’s eye was the garden, an honest-to-god garden, enclosed by a redwood fence. It was mostly lawn, a few bushes, a couple of bedraggled flowers dotted here and there. But it was—peaceful.

He snuck a glance at his brother, where he still sat like some fucking yogi. But that look in his eye… “This is why you picked it.”

Andrew gave a short nod, one hand gently stroking the cat in his lap. “If we’re going to be stuck here for a few years, might as well make it worthwhile.”

It shouldn’t have struck Aaron like a blow to the chest. A simple sentence; a simple sentiment. But Aaron had always been the one to plan for the future, struggling under the weight of Andrew’s cool amusement at such a concept. Andrew had never expected to see the next day.

The rumble of a truck from the direction of the driveway had everyone turning in comical unison. Andrew got to his feet with his armful of cat; Neil swiped the second one off the stairs when it went to bolt, and both of the furballs found themselves deposited in the bathroom, the door closed securely behind them. Aaron trailed behind them to the front door, not missing the way Andrew’s fingers brushed lightly against Neil’s back, nor the way Neil leaned into him in response.

It was a tiny fragment of a movement, easily missed. Always, with them, this subtle softness, almost hidden. He thought of the easy warmth of Katelyn, melting any barriers he had thrown up, and he wondered, not for the first time, if Nicky was wrong about Andrew and Neil. If maybe this really was all that they were capable after all they had been through. But the back of the truck was thrown open, and the moving guys were joking around with Neil as he snagged a box, and Aaron shoved the thought aside as he went down to help.

Time flew by in a flurry of moving bodies, of noise and cardboard and cloth and wood. Katelyn inserted herself right in the middle of the complicated dance, and Aaron wanted to make her stop, make her sit down or at least take it easy. She somehow read his thoughts, and shot him a laughing, mocking glance of disdain as she picked up yet another lamp. He knew she was fine; he _knew_ ; all his medical training told him this was safe, but even so he watched her, snatching a heavy box from her arms in exchange for a huge one full of pillows.

The third time he grabbed something out of her hands and nudged her towards something lighter in return she stepped on his foot. “Aaron,” she hissed, and there was something dangerous glinting in her eyes. “I. Am. Fine. And not like, Neil fine, I am actually fine.”

“Rude!” Neil said, stumbling past with an ottoman in his arms.

“Sorry not sorry!” Katelyn called after him. “Save your fretting for like, five months from now,” she snapped at Aaron once the others were out of earshot, “and let me live my life.”

With that, she plucked the box of books out of the truck and spun towards the house, making it up the steps with the uncanny grace born of years of dance training. Aaron sighed and started to turned back to the truck, only to find Andrew watching him from the top of the driveway. “Fuck,” he muttered under his breath. But Andrew didn’t say anything, just hefted the box labeled _Kitchen_ onto his shoulder and trailed Aaron’s wife up the steps.

Somehow, over the course of the next four hours, the echoing house became almost a home. The moving guys had left long ago, the box of donuts Andrew supplied them with tucked under Raoul’s arm. Rugs, far nicer than the ratty ones that had once graced the Columbia house, dotted the floors; furniture, though sparse, was installed in most of the rooms; and the four of them had managed to get the necessities unpacked and the pictures set out, resting against the walls where they would eventually hang.

Andrew stood in front of the huge built-in bookcase, arranging and rearranging. Neil was bustling around in the kitchen, accompanied by some clanging and muttered cursing that everyone ignored. Katelyn draped herself across one of the dining room chairs with a glass of water, letting the air conditioning work its magic. Aaron started futzing around with the TV, hooking up the bluray player and the gaming system. There was far less furniture than the space called for, and he was wondering idly what they planned to do about that fact when Neil popped his head out of the kitchen.

“Salmon okay for lunch?” He directed the question at Katelyn, to Aaron’s amusement. “They had some nice fresh stuff at the store last night.”

Katelyn glanced at Aaron with a flash of panic in her eyes. “Um, do you have something else? I’m not really eating fish right now.”

Neil chewed on his lip for a second as he studied her. The fucker was too smart for his own good, Aaron thought, as he saw understanding flicker across his face. “Uh, sure. Yeah. We loaded up on groceries yesterday. Chicken okay? Or do you want something vegetarian?” He was clearly asking Katelyn, but he was looking at Andrew, who had paused in his shelving to watch the conversation.

“Either’s fine,” Katelyn said, interrupting the silent conversation Neil and Andrew were having. “Can I help?”

“Lemon okay?” Neil asked in lieu of an answer. “And potatoes or pasta better?”

“Both sound good, so whatever’s easier. You sure you don’t want help?”

“No, I’ve got it,” Neil said, disappearing back into the kitchen. Andrew watched him go, then shook his head minutely in Aaron’s direction and returned to his task.

They both finished before lunch was ready, and Aaron followed Andrew upstairs with the boxes of linens. Andrew directed Aaron and his box into the one guest room that had a bed, but as soon as Aaron deposited his burden he followed his brother into the main bedroom. Andrew ignored him, even when Aaron helped unfurl the fitted sheet and get it tucked in around the corners of the mattress.

“What was Neil all up in arms about earlier?” Aaron asked, his voice cracking the strange peace between them.

Andrew gave a tiny shrug that almost blended into his efforts to stuff a pillow into a pillowcase. “He’s never owned a house before,” he said, as if that was some sort of answer. Maybe for him, for them, it was.

One of the cats—Aaron still wasn’t sure which was which—leaped onto the bed as they tried to settle the flat sheet into place, attacking the fabric with joyful abandon. Andrew scooped the beast off the bed and held it up to his face. “You are sorely lacking in dignity,” he said flatly, then set it down and dropped the comforter on top, leaving the cat a purring lump in the center.

“Who the fuck are you?” Aaron asked, shaking his head with mock dismay.

Andrew flipped him off over one shoulder, free hand tearing the tape off a box marked Clothes. They shoved hangers into shirts; laughter trickled up the stairs, a familiar harmony of soprano and tenor. Aaron was never going to recover from the absurdity of Katelyn and Neil becoming something resembling friends. Theoretically he should be happy about it, but it was bad enough his brother was practically married to the guy...

“Katelyn’s pregnant.” The words burst out of him against his will; she was only nine weeks in and they had promised not to tell anyone until the magical twelfth week. “Fuck.”

Andrew’s hands had frozen on a hanger, but they resumed their movement a split second later. “Neil was right. He’s going to be insufferable.”

“Okay, a., how is that different from any other day, and b., how the hell—”

“It’s your fault. You were acting like a jackass, and he bet me fifty bucks she was pregnant.” He hung another shirt.

“Spends too much fucking time with Allison,” Aaron grumbled under his breath. Andrew made a little noise of agreement, and together they finished unpacking the clothes, listening to the music of their partners’ voices echoing from below.

“Andrew—” Aaron broke off. He didn’t even know what he wanted to ask; there was no good way to ask this, really. _How do I not fuck this up? What if this is the Minyard curse? Or the Hemmick one? Doomed to be a shitty abusive parent in some form or another._

Andrew was looking at him, waiting. Patient and steady. Another peal of laughter trickled up, and one of Andrew’s eyebrows went up. “She won’t let you,” he said, his voice as level and emotionless as always, even as he gestured to Aaron’s temple. “Whatever clusterfuck you have going on in there, she won’t let you fuck this up, not completely.”

Without waiting for a response, Andrew turned on his heel and headed for the stairs and the delicious aromas that were wafting up. Aaron trailed after him more slowly, puzzling it over in his head. Andrew and Neil had long ago developed that weird silent communication thing, but despite being Andrew’s twin, Aaron had always been on the outside looking in. He didn’t understand how Andrew had known the riot of joy and terror that had been swirling around in Aaron’s brain for the past month, ever since that stupid, miraculous line had turned blue.

Halfway down the stairs he realized this may have been the only nice-ish thing Andrew had ever said about Katelyn. He huffed a laugh to himself. Maybe Neil had some redeeming qualities after all. One redeeming quality. Maybe.

Neil hip-checked Andrew on his way past him with plates that had been hastily dug out of boxes. Katelyn greeted Aaron with an arched-eyebrow smile, her face soft and flush with humor. He lifted the water glasses out of her hand and set them on the table so he could pull her into a kiss. When they broke apart, Andrew and Neil were scrabbling in another box for silverware, shoving each other with shoulders while they dug through the mess.

“Okay, someone doesn’t get a fork,” Neil announced after a minute. “Somehow we have eight knives, sixteen spoons, and three forks.” He shoved against Andrew again. “I blame the management.”

“I can function without a fork,” Katelyn offered. Neil ignored her and took his seat at the forkless plate. “I can.”

“I have no doubt,” he said mildly, and then stabbed his chicken with his spoon.

Andrew was staring at his partner, the corners of his eyes crinkling in something soft, something intimate. It was like watching two normal people fuck, and Aaron found himself feeling compelled to look away. He cautiously took a bite of the food, then stared at his plate, wondering when Neil had learned how to cook. He’d certainly never been more than mediocre in college, but this was—good.

Asshole.

“Wow, Neil,” Katelyn said, putting her fork to good use. “This is fantastic.”

Neil shrugged, the back of his neck turning red, and mumbled something about the trainers. Katelyn took that up, asking about their nutritionist and talking about what (little) they had learned about the role of nutrition in healing during med school.

Somehow Neil managed to segue that into a rant about politics; the thought process that got him there eluded Aaron but it did lead to a mostly joking argument that in no way threatened to become a fight. Aaron found himself playing devil’s advocate just to watch Neil’s tongue get sharper and sharper—at least until Katelyn kicked him, none too gently, under the table.

The afternoon passed in a cacophony of hammering. The cats had both disappeared to who knew where; Aaron suspected if the hammering weren’t enough, the arguing over where pictures should go would’ve pushed them over the edge. Katelyn smothered a smile over one particularly vociferous discussion over an enormous photograph of something that looked like the barrel of a gun but was, apparently, olive oil being poured out of a bottle. “He sounds like you,” she said, gesturing at Andrew with her chin as she walked past.

“Does not.”

He did.

The sun was resting on the mountaintops by the time they finally stopped, exhausted. The four of them collapsed in various locations, stuffing shitty delivery pizza into their mouths. By the time Andrew collected their plates, Katelyn was asleep on the couch.

“Is she okay?” Neil asked, looking vaguely as though he thought he was supposed to be concerned.

“I’m awake,” Katelyn mumbled, before rolling so her face was smashed into the couch cushion.

Aaron couldn’t help the little tug at his lips as he looked at her, arm dangling off the couch. The slightly less enormous of the two cats sniffed at her fingers, then butted its head against her hand. “She’s fine, she just does this.”

“Is it the internship or the pregnancy?”

Aaron shot Neil a look; he might have guessed it, but he still shouldn’t just...talk about it like that. Neil huffed a laugh at his expression. “She told me while we were making lunch. Not that you weren’t pretty fucking obvious.”

Aaron cleared his throat; Andrew had said much the same thing. He would have to be more careful when they got back to the hospital. “It’s neither. She’s always been like this, she can sleep anywhere.”

Neil hummed, a grin spreading across his face. “Like Kevin, then. Remember the pyramid?”

A video played in Aaron’s mind, of Kevin sacked out on the couch in the stadium lounge, the team building a pyramid of exy balls on his chest. It had gotten four levels tall before a particularly deep breath had displaced one ball, which rolled to smack Kevin in the face. He had not been pleased, but even Andrew had laughed at a bewildered Kevin surrounded by bouncing, rolling balls.

He met Andrew’s eyes, and there were little tiny crinkles next to them, a silent laugh but one Aaron heard anyway. It struck him—

Andrew was going to have laugh lines, sometime in the nebulous future. Aaron would too. A miracle, or a prize hard one? Maybe both. Most people would say he was stupid or crazy for being grateful for wrinkles, but most people didn’t understand that laughter was a triumph.

Then Katelyn let out a snuffling noise that Aaron could never ever call a snore if he wanted to escape with his life, and Neil laughed, and that too-vital moment was broken. “I better take her to bed,” Aaron said.

“What?” Katelyn asked, or at least that was what he thought she asked, it was too muffled in the pillow to know for sure.

“We’re going to sleep.”

“I’m not asleep,” she muttered, rolling onto her side. “I’m just resting my eyes.”

“Okay, but we’re going to go do that upstairs.”

Somehow he coaxed her to her feet; by the time they were upstairs she was walking under her own steam. They washed up in the generic bathroom with the unhung pictures leaning against the baseboards, then crawled into bed, where Katelyn tucked herself up against Aaron’s shoulder. It was barely nine o’clock, but sleep was a rare commodity and Aaron let it wash over him, the heaviness dragging at his eyelids until—

“Is that music?” Katelyn murmured.

It was; the quiet strains of something old and familiar, some sort of old folksong he thought maybe he had heard Nicky’s mother play, though Aaron had no idea what it was called. “Must be the neighbors,” he said.

“It’s not.” Katelyn was abruptly awake. She slipped out of bed and peered out the window; their room overlooked the backyard, and there was a faint light coming in through window.

Aaron closed his eyes; it was impossible, that Neil and Andrew would listen to something like this, something so hokey and cliche and...romantic.

“Aaron, get your ass over here,” Katelyn hissed. “You’ve got to see this.”

He grumbled as he joined her at the window, blinking as he stared out into the yard where the moon, near full, hung like a spotlight. There was a lumpy shadow out on the silvery grass; no, two shadows, so close they appeared as one. Andrew and Neil, swaying in a clumsy slow dance as the music played. While they watched, Neil tilted his head back and laughed at whatever Andrew had said; suddenly Aaron felt like a voyeur, like he was seeing something illicit, forbidden. He took Katelyn’s hand and tugged her back to the bed.

They lay there, listening as one song moved onto the next, then the next. “I never thought they could be like that,” Katelyn said, her breath tickling the shell of Aaron’s ear.

_Me neither_ , Aaron wanted to say. But then, he never had thought he would have this with Katelyn either. He had never thought himself capable of softness, not after he was molded into something hard and brittle by harsh hands and harsh words, by poverty and fear and drugs. He had been destined to be a statistic, until he had looked into that funhouse mirror and everything had changed.

He didn’t have words for her, not then. So he kissed her softly, and she tasted sweet as she always did, and they fell asleep with the music still washing over them.

[ _Then we sat on our own star and dreamed of the way that we were_ ](https://open.spotify.com/track/0f1AXdlOJodHFKdaHHIM9c)

[ _And the way that we wanted to be_ ](https://open.spotify.com/track/0f1AXdlOJodHFKdaHHIM9c)

[ _Then we sat on our own star and dreamed of the way that I was for you_ ](https://open.spotify.com/track/0f1AXdlOJodHFKdaHHIM9c)

[ _And you were for me_ ](https://open.spotify.com/track/0f1AXdlOJodHFKdaHHIM9c)

[ _And then we danced the night away_ ](https://open.spotify.com/track/0f1AXdlOJodHFKdaHHIM9c)

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why I keep headcanoning Neil as liking 60s/70s music but I do. I like to think of him having very eclectic taste and this reminding him of the few good times while he and his mother were on the run and she would sing along to the radio. The lyrics and title come from the Van Morrison song The Way Young Lovers Do. 
> 
> Comments are my lifeblood, even if I struggle with the concept of replying, so I really look forward to hearing what you all think of this bit of Extreme Fluff! And you can hmu any time at [my Tumblr](https://fuzzballsheltiepants.tumblr.com)


End file.
